Mobility of Nonsticky Nanoparticles in Polymer Liquids

We use scaling theory to derive the time dependence of the mean-square displacement 〈Δr2〉 of a spherical probe particle of size d experiencing thermal motion in polymer solutions and melts. Particles with size smaller than solution correlation length ξ undergo ordinary diffusion (〈Δr2 (t)〉 ~ t) with diffusion coefficient similar to that in pure solvent. The motion of particles of intermediate size (ξ d a), where a is the tube diameter for entangled polymer liquids, is sub-diffusive (〈Δr2 (t)〉 ~ t1/2) at short time scales since their motion is affected by sub-sections of polymer chains. At long time scales the motion of these particles is diffusive and their diffusion coefficient is determined by the effective viscosity of a polymer liquid with chains of size comparable to the particle diameter d. The motion of particles larger than the tube diameter a at time scales shorter than the relaxation time τ e of an entanglement strand is similar to the motion of particles of intermediate size. At longer time scales (t > τ e ) large particles (d > a) are trapped by entanglement mesh and to move further they have to wait for the surrounding polymer chains to relax at the reptation time scale τrep. At longer times t > τrep, the motion of such large particles (d > a) is diffusive with diffusion coefficient determined by the bulk viscosity of the entangled polymer liquids. Our predictions are in agreement with the results of experiments and computer simulations.